Patchwork
by literatiwannabe
Summary: ...So really, even if the moment wasn’t precisely perfect, anything that involved a naked Samantha Carter came close enough... COMPLETE


Author: Christi 17, I suppose….

Category: HORRIFYINGLY syrupy, sugary sweet fluff that's trying to disguise itself as real fic and failing miserably.

--

He couldn't quite get a full breath yet, still gasping for air as the sweat cooled on his skin. It was probably just the endorphins still racing through his body that made the world fuzzy at the edges and had him believing that this moment was perfect.

Probably.

But the fact was that Sam lay underneath him, sprawled across the slightly faded squares of his grandmother's quilt and seeming quite short of breath herself. So really, even if the moment _wasn't_ precisely perfect, anything that involved a naked Samantha Carter came close enough.

He was still touching her—in fact, he couldn't seem to _stop_. Nuzzling her stomach, tracing down her sides, entangling his legs with hers, all so unconsciously that the only thing that registered was the slightly delirious repetition in his brain of _samsamsamsam_. There may have even been some (very brief) hand holding, though he'd rather file a thousand requisition reports in one day than admit to it.

Better to just rest the side of his face on her stomach and concentrate on trying to _breathe_.

--

For the first time in—well, in entirely too long—Sam couldn't seem to hold on to a rational train of thought. Instead, she was flooded with sensations and feelings and half-formed queries that didn't quite string together.

She noted that the cabin smelled a little musty and thought it was strange considering they had been here not a month ago, back when they could say for the first time that the only issue between them really _was_ the regs. But maybe a Minnesota summer could do that.

She wished Jack would stop running his hands down her legs because her nerves were still alert and over-sensitized. While the feeling was good in theory, if she didn't get a few minutes to process everything, to properly register that after years they were finally _here_, she'd probably implode.

She wondered how her underwear had managed to be removed almost the second they had walked in the door, and yet one of her shoes had only been discarded next to the bed—but then she remembered how they had tripped over the threshold and how Jack had slid down her body, teeth and lips and tongue while she collapsed against the front door.

She realized that her feet were slightly elevated, and it took a moment to realize it was because they were resting on the pillows. Looking to her right, she saw the post of the bed's footboard. Rolling to her stomach, she ran her fingers over the wood for a moment before resting her head on her hands and breaking into peals of helpless laughter. When Jack tilted his head, bewildered by her abrupt amusement, she just gestured wildly, not sure where to start.

"We're a bit ridiculous is all," she finally said.

--

Feeling lazy and silly and _happyhappyhappy_, Jack just had to smile, resting his chin on her shoulder. She was right really, but then he had learned a long time ago that Carter usually was.

"There are worse things," he pointed out, pressing a kiss against the nape of her neck, hands still moving across her body.

There was a curious sense of relief in every movement, and he found himself curbing the impulse to babble out everything he had ever wanted to tell her, but deemed too personal, too close.

He wanted to tell her that this was his grandmother's quilt. She had started to make it the day after her wedding and finally managed to finish it a week after Charlie was born. The pieces were memories—wedding dresses and christening gowns and torn blue jeans, and now Sam was a part of that for him, a piece of the whole.

He wanted to tell her about his grandfather who had his only two children at the age of 58 and lived long enough to fish with Jack every summer until he graduated from high school.

He wanted to tell her that science had been Charlie's favorite subject, which was silly because he didn't talk about Charlie, and even if he wanted to, now was hardly the time.

But he wanted to all the same.

Instead, he ran his hands down her back, relishing the feel of skin beneath his fingertips. "Do you know how many fantasies I've had about this back?" he breathed, nipping at her left shoulder blade.

It wasn't particularly romantic or soulful as confessions go, but it would do.

--

Hands over her back, concentric circles round and round that slowly heated up what _had_ been cooling skin. Why had she wanted him to stop again? A delighted hum filled the air, an involuntary praise of the havoc he wreaked so quietly on her body without really having to try too hard. Still….

"My _back_?" she asked, amused. It seemed like a strange body part to fixate on. But then, she had always had an irrational fascination with his hands. Which of course, had turned out to be as perfect as she had imagined, long and dexterous and calloused in all the right places, catching against just enough skin….

His mouth was working its way down her spine, a line of heated kissed and nips straight down her back as his hands led the way south, sliding around her ass and over her legs and then back up and _oh_...

As he slid two of those perfect fingers into her, she briefly considered proposing to him. Which was irrational because they'd be separated by half a country after this two week reprieve, and even if that wasn't an issue it was too soon and too much and too fanciful of an idea to have come from Sam Carter's brain.

Then he shifted his fingers a little up and to the right and the flash of heat in her body made her wonder if maybe a week would be a long enough waiting period.

--

She was warm and responsive and so beautiful lying there, handfuls of the quilt twisted in her fingers while she thrust back against him and he remembered the silver blanket and the expanse of skin. Maybe there wasn't a way to explain that he had been so busy trying not to look down the _front_ of her makeshift covering that he had ended up ogling the _back_.

He suspected that it was something that wouldn't make sense to anyone else. So he just let it go because at least he had told her _something_. Wondering at how easy this all was and wondering if it would last and wondering what was going on in her head—none of it mattered, because he quickened the pace of his fingers and she broke apart, a quiet gasp and blue, blue eyes staring at him.

_Sam_.

Another smile broke free and he didn't even try to stop it because she was here and everything else would sort itself out. Jack wasn't sure when he had become an optimist, but he figured that it was sometime between an arm wrestle invitation and two seconds ago. What difference did it make?

The need to tell her things—silly, stupid things—was still there and still as unfamiliar as ever. But maybe he could learn to live with it or maybe it would fade in time—either would be fine. In the meanwhile, he decided to just go with it.

"I love you," he said. It wasn't a confession or a revelation or melodramatic or expected—it was just what _was_.

An unsurprised blink and a perfect smile were the responses he received. After another moment her hand rose and threaded through his hair, drawing him down for one quick kiss, then another.

Pulling away, she just kept smiling. "I like your quilt," she finally said.

He grinned, flopping his head back on his hands with a contented sigh. "It was my grandmother's."


End file.
